Leaderboard

It's tangentially related. So much of the music changes and debranding efforts are coinciding with the graphics rollout. It won't last forever, and we'll get back to the graphics in no time.

I feel fortunate that I've only ever worked for bygone-era small station groups that no longer exist and O&Os. I think the likes of Scripps, Tegna, Nexstar, Gray et al are in for a perilous financial future as they have far fewer alternate revenue streams. The O&Os at least will be able to rely on live sports in major markets and the backing of the network to stay relevant to some degree. For a rural market ~120 station with no major national or college sports team, what is the roadmap? Advertising is way down everywhere. Retrans fees will likely go away. The networks don't really need partnerships with affiliates much longer now that they have their own streaming platforms (not that those are making any money either.) Syndicated programming is going away, and these kinds of stations can't really replace it with more news as it's near-impossible to find more 22-year-olds willing to endure the grueling quality of life of working in small market TV. I think what's happening at Scripps, particularly in the small markets, is a telltale sign of just how rocky the industry will become in the next 5-10 years at the lower end. I'm not sure if the other station groups will go to the same extreme lengths that Scripps is currently taking, but I think we will see more small market stations shut down news departments and farm out their news to regional and national divisions within their station groups. I don't think these problems are confined to OTA television either. I think the economics of the entire entertainment industry are fundamentally broken. The only thing that still makes money is advertising on conventional distribution platforms, but that audience has been shrinking for decades. Nobody other than Netflix has been able to figure out how to monetize online media in a meaningful way. Streaming has become so saturated that I'm not fully convinced it'll work out for any of the media conglomerates.

For a second I thought this was the "Channel 1 News" that provided TVs to schools free of charge while pumping students full of advertising.... But they've been defunct since 2018.

WMAQ, Chicago; weekend, 1979:

This feels very dystopian to me.

Tegna must have forgotten they have acquired some long-standing juggernauts, for some of those crown jewels were lost in the shuffle are now a shell of themselves (see WFAA, WWL) thanks to the tomfoolery over the years. I understand company mandates, but everything isn't meant for everyone.

"Direct from our CBSNN Newsroom in Washington, this is The Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer on CBS"

Axios is reporting that Paramount is in talks to be merged with WBD: https://www.axios.com/2023/12/20/warner-bros-paramount-merger-discovery-streaming?utm_source=twitter&utm_campaign=editorial&utm_medium=social